How to Build a Black Hole

Black holes are among the most extreme objects in the universe. They’re regions of space where gravity is so powerful that not even light can escape. Stephen Hawking predicted that black holes slowly radiate energy and eventually evaporate, while Roger Penrose showed that energy can be extracted from rotating black holes. Despite everything we know, some of the most fundamental black hole physics remain beyond direct experimental reach.

In this Presidential Lecture, Silke Weinfurtner will show how black holes can be recreated in the laboratory. Flowing fluids — from ordinary water to exotic quantum liquids cooled to within a fraction of a degree above absolute zero — can behave exactly like the space surrounding a black hole. When the flow exceeds the speed of the waves on its surface, those waves cannot return. That point of no return is a black hole horizon, and the physics that follows is black hole physics. These laboratory black holes make it possible to study Hawking radiation, superradiance and even the conditions for a black hole bomb, bringing some of the deepest questions in modern physics into the experimental realm.

Weinfurtner is a professor of applied quantum technology at the University of Manchester, a Leverhulme Research Leadership Fellow, and co-chair of the CERN Quantum Technology Initiative. She is internationally recognized for pioneering laboratory studies of black hole physics and leading the first experimental observation of stimulated Hawking radiation and Penrose superradiance in an analog black hole system. She previously led the UK Quantum Simulators for Fundamental Physics network and now develops experiments using superfluid helium for quantum simulations and quantum sensing. Beyond research, she serves on the Creative Manchester Strategic Advisory Board and co-curates Cosmic Titans, a major art-science exhibition exploring black holes, quantum physics and humanity’s place in the universe.